Behind the Info Desk, Elliott Bay Book Co., Seattle

One day last year in December, I was working behind the front counter, helping people ringing up sales. At one point I looked up. There was a line of people from the front counter stretched back the entire length of the store to the information desk that was, I’m guessing, 70 people deep standing there with their baskets and their arms full of books. We were not having a sale event. We were not doing any discounts. We did not have the sexiest new game or device or anything like that. They had come because they wanted to buy their books and their gifts from us—and pay the full retail price and stand in line to do that.

People understand that if they want to continue to have choices and things that they value available to them, they have to vote with their feet and their wallets.